


Just a Little Bit's Enough

by Flyting



Category: Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: Aftercare, Anal Sex, Angst, Ben Solo Needs A Hug, Brendol needs a kick in the nuts, Hurt/Comfort, Hux is actually not awful, M/M, Non-Consensual Oral Sex, Rape/Non-con Elements, Underage Sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-08
Updated: 2017-05-08
Packaged: 2018-10-29 08:39:36
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,643
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10850397
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Flyting/pseuds/Flyting
Summary: Armitage loves Ben, but Ben belongs to Brendol. All he can do is pick up the pieces afterwards.Ben has already seen himself in the refresher mirror, after the Commander finally finished with him for the night and he crept off to take a shower. He doesn’t need to see it reflected in Hux’s eyes.“Did he do this?” Hux’s voice is low, cold, like he’s considering doing something about it, father or not.“Nah, it was a couple of junior officer corps guys.” Ben tries for flippant, but it only comes out strained. “I’m rent-to-own now, apparently. Yours for three easy payments of ninety-nine credits.”“Ben, stop.” His thumb touches the scratch on Ben’s cheek.Angsty Hurt/Comfort with young Ben and Armitage, written for a kyluxhardkinks prompt.





	Just a Little Bit's Enough

**Author's Note:**

> Heed the tags! This fic contains both graphic and implied noncon, underage sex, and a buttload of angst. Ben is about 16 here, which makes him 15 in the flashback with Hux.
> 
> Written for [this](http://kyluxhardkinks.tumblr.com/post/160310941066/prompt-with-ben-solo-brendol-hux-below-warnings) kyluxhardkinks prompt, although I think I made it more angsty and less kinky than the author intended because I fail at life.

The door to the Commander’s office slides open silently at the man’s approach. Ben follows obediently at his heels, his eyes distant, taking in the familiar faint gray geometric pattern of the carpet without really seeing it.

Hux is right behind him. Ben can feel the weight of his soft green eyes, checking for any lingering stiffness, any trace of a limp in Ben’s movements. This is the first they’ve seen each other in the past four cycles. Hux has been away on some important mission for Admiral Sloane that he wasn’t allowed to talk about, but that Ben could only hope wasn’t dangerous.

Seeing him standing there suddenly in the lobby outside the Commander’s office, lean and tall with his junior officer’s cap tucked under his arm like he belonged there, like he’d never left... Ben just glad that the Commander wasn’t looking his way. He’s sure his face would have betrayed them.

Luckily, Hux is a much better liar Ben is. His gaze barely flicks to Ben, hovering behind the Commander like a servant or a ghost. Although when it does, for that one heartbeat, there is a softness there that Ben knows is just for him.

The Commander snaps his fingers twice, sharply, and Ben hurries to kneel where he points, on the carpet beside the imposing desk chair. He lowers his head, stares at the floor, and doesn’t open his mouth. He knows better. It is chilly in the office, and Ben has to fight the urge to shiver. His pants are thin, cheap things, that cling to his legs, and the wide neck of his t-shirt leaves most of his shoulders exposed to the cold air. They were made to be pretty, not comfortable. To make a boy with wide shoulders and long limbs look soft and fragile.

Hux takes the chair across from them. Smoothes back his hair idly with one hand. His hat is balanced carefully on knees which Ben knows are knobby and freckled beneath the rough fabric of his uniform jodhpurs.

“So you’ve deigned to rejoin us, then. Does the Admiral have no more use for you?”

Ben listens silently, the carpet biting into his own knees. He’s used to people talking around him.

“Not currently, sir. Thank you for approving my leave of absence.”

“Well I hardly had a choice, did I? Not when duty beckons.”

Although Ben has never met Admiral Sloane, he knows that the Commander resents her hold over his son. He’s heard him talking about it during holoconferences the Commander has spent with Ben’s mouth wrapped around his cock. In the times when he does not think they are plotting against him, the Commander thinks that Sloane has found a similar use for Hux.

“Thank you, sir,” Hux says again, in that carefully bland tone that betrays nothing of his true feelings.

“May I ask what sort of errand she had you on this time?”  
  
Hux hesitates. “I’m sorry, sir, but it’s confidential. There have been concerns about espionage. ”

“Espionage! It’s hardly espionage for a father to be concerned about his son.”

“Yes, sir. I’m sorry, sir.” The bland tone is back, giving away nothing.

Ben watches him surreptitiously from under the unruly fringe of his hair. His face is neutral, but hidden from the Commander’s view, his fingers dig into the rough fabric of his uniform. They all know that only time the Commander ever reminds Hux that he is his father is when he wants something from him. Ben wishes he could take Hux’s pale hand in his own. He wishes a lot of things, though, and doesn’t often get them.

The Commander deflates in his chair a little when he realizes that his ploy has been unsuccessful. “You’re responsible for the work that you missed,” he barks, waving a dismissing hand “If you fall behind in your classes you’ll never go on another of her damned errands again. I am still allowed that, as your father, am I not?”

“Of course, sir.”

“Dismissed.”

Hux gives a stiff salute, one hand fisted over his chest, before replacing his hat and turning to leave. Somewhere in all of that, there is just the barest second where his pale eyes meet Ben’s dark ones. A glance, that’s all. It’ll have to be enough for now. Maybe if they’re lucky they can exchange a few hurried words later-

Then the door slides shut silently behind Hux and Ben is left alone with the Commander. He kneels, still and quiet as a statue, hoping that he has been forgotten. One of his legs is cramping from the position, but he doesn’t dare shift to move it.

For a few long minutes, Ben starts to hope that maybe he has been forgotten. The Commander works at his desk for a while, jabbing irritably at his datapad with one thick, calloused finger, occasionally muttering under his breath, before he tosses the device to the side.

“Here,” he snaps his fingers again, and the pit drops out of Ben’s stomach even as he scrambles to obey, to sit on the desk like he’s told, legs spread, his silk-clad knees dangling over the edge. Then the Commander is pushing into his space, between his legs, the familiar starched smell of him in his mouth. Ben is big for his age, all stick-insect limbs, but the Commander is bulky and broad as well as tall, and he overwhelms Ben easily.

“The nerve of that boy.” The Commander fists a handful of Ben’s thin, impractical pants and dragging them down his ass, so that Ben has to shuffle and kick to be out of them without ripping them. He grabs a handful of Ben’s ass and squeezes. “Arrogant. Disobedient-” Ben’s knees are pushed apart until his hipbones creak, but he knows better than to cry out- he knows-

“Stay.”

The last is directed at Ben. He struggles to hold the position, his bare legs spread wide in the chilly room, cock hanging soft between them and his cheeks faintly pink with embarrassment even after all this time, while the Commander unpacks his cock and slicks it with a half-used tube of lubricant from his desk drawer.

“You had better be ready,” he growls in warning, leaning over Ben again, one large hand pushing up his thigh, the other guiding his cock in. It was Ben’s job to make sure that he was slick and stretched open and ready at all times. The fear of getting fucked dry is more than enough to motivate him.

The first rough push feels like getting the wind knocked out of him. Too quick, too rough. The Commander pulls back, captures Ben’s legs in his calloused hands and hitching them over his shoulders before forcing himself back in. And again. Again. The rhythm is brutal- deep, violent thrusts. Ben braces his hands on the polished surface of the desk, trying to prevent himself from being fucked across it.

“Good boy, little republic slut- you know your place don’t you?” the Commander pants in his ear.

Ben knows his lines. This isn’t the first time or the fifth or the tenth, but they still feel disgusting in his mouth, “Yes, sir, I love it, I love it-” A little sound of pain is forced out between his teeth by a rough thrust.

Every time he catches his breath it’s knocked out of him. Ben pants, wetness gathering in the corner of his eye. He feels like a doll being twisted into position. A toy, a thing to be fucked on his back like a whore, with the rough fabric of the Commander’s uniform scratching his soft thighs as he’s bent nearly double.

The Commander smacks him, one quick warning strike across his cheek, and Ben realizes that he’s closed his eyes.

“What do you say? Ungrateful little slut-” he pants. His breath is sour on Ben’s face.

Ben forces the words out without thinking.“Thank you sir, thank you for giving me your cock, thank you-”

The Commander comes with a grunt and a pulse of warm wetness inside him.

There is a little refresher off of the Commander’s office- just a sink and a toilet, really. When the Commander is finished with him, Ben is allowed to creep off and clean himself up.

The boy in the refresher mirror has a bruised look to him. Shadows under his eyes and pale from too little sunlight.

He dawdles in there for as long as he safely can. Relieving himself, splashing a little bit of cold water on his face, and doing his best to clean the come out of his ass while avoiding the eyes of the boy in the mirror, before returning to his knees in the Commander’s office.

After lunch, the Commander fucks his mouth, twisting his short fingers in Ben’s hair.

Ben thinks about Hux and wonders what he’s doing. Whether he’s gone straight back to his classes or whether he’ll go back to his quarters and rest. Probably the first one, Hux doesn’t sleep enough, always says he has too much to do. Ben hopes he got to rest on his mission, that it wasn’t dangerous-

Another stinging little slap on the cheek forces his attention back to what he’s doing. It’s a warning. “You can do better than that.”

Ben stops thinking about Hux and redoubles his efforts, bobbing his head and moaning around the cock in his mouth like the whore they tell him he is, until he can swallow down another load of come.

“Thank you, sir,” he says without prompting, the way he’s been taught. His voice is rough, throat scratchy.

“For what?” the Commander pushes, one hand still gripping Ben’s hair tightly, forcing his neck back. He is still on his knees, crouched between the man’s legs.

“Thank you for your come, sir. Thank you for using my whore mouth the way I deserve,” Ben says.

The hand in his hair loosens, slips down to pat him once one the cheek. “Good boy,” he says, like Ben is a pet that’s fetched his slippers.

“-it just takes a firm hand and consistency. Even a little republic bitch like this one can be trained,” the Commander says later. Ben has zoned out through a trickle of dull meetings with a parade of identical-looking men with regulation haircuts and pressed uniforms, until he realizes he’s being spoken about.

The officer sitting in the chair Hux had vacated that morning is older, with dark hair and a pinched, angular face. He eyes Ben disapprovingly, like he’s something that just messed on the carpet.

“We picked him up as a runaway a few years ago. Tell Captain Treda where you’re from, boy,”

“I was born on Chandrila, sir,” Ben thinks of Hux and forces the words out, his voice expressionless. His voice is still scratchy from earlier.

Captain Treda snorts, “Those deplorables,” he says to the Commander, conversationally, “Don’t get me started. I was at Hanna City before the fall, you know. One of their senators had a public wedding to a human woman and a Zabrak man and the entire damned city shut down with celebration, like that depravity was something to be proud of. Half-humans would just walk right up to you on the street and ask for credits.”

“My point, exactly. This one had no manners, no discipline whatsoever when they sent him to me. Shouting and biting, always trying to run off-”

Treda clucks his tongue, disapproving. Ben feels his cheeks color faintly. “It’s the same with the new junior troopers, the ones they send to me from maker-knows-where. Crying all night and climbing the walls. I never thought I’d miss those damned clones.”

“You have to be patient. Put them right back in place when they act out. It may take a few lashes, the old fashioned way, if they’re not used to discipline, but even this one learned his place eventually.” The Commander nudges Ben with his boot. "Didn't you?"  
  
"Yes, sir."

“I tried to make something useful of him, but in the end he wasn’t fit to be anything more than a whore.”

Ben does not remember being given any other choices, but he does not say so.

“Some of them simply aren’t good for much, unfortunately. Call it poor breeding, coddling, what-have you. We can’t cross-train them like we used to. It requires a bit more finesse. Let them find their niche.”

“And that works?”

“In my experience.”

Ben is expecting the command before it comes, is braced for it, but the pit still drops out of his stomach when the Commander says, “Show Captain Treda what a good boy you are, Ben.”

He does not need to be told to crawl to the Captain on his hands and knees, or to try to look attractive while he does so. When he opens his mouth and the words, “Please, sir, can I suck your cock? Please, I need it, I need you to use my filthy republic slut mouth. I need your cock, please,” fall out, he pretends that he is a mynamock bird repeating sounds he doesn’t understand.

The Captain is longer than the Commander, but not as thick, and he forces himself all the way down Ben’s throat on the second thrust. It burns, his throat spasming. The Captain pushes Ben’s fringe back out of his face, watching him closely while he chokes and drools. “He is a greedy little slut, isn’t he? That’s it, boy, swallow...” he pants at Ben when he gags.

“An incorrigible whore. I lock him in his room at night, just so he doesn’t go wandering. Got him just in the nick of time, too. He was already fourteen when we found him- I doubt he would have been a virgin much longer.”

Ben fakes a moan and withdraws a little to use his tongue, trying to get it over with. His throat is already sore, abused, and the Commander will probably have him at least one more time today. He would rather have it in his mouth than his ass. At least then they don’t expect him to talk-

“That’s it- take it, good little slut-” Treda groans as he comes. “Brendol, you must let me borrow him this evening. I have a few honors boys just back from a successful pacification campaign, and I promised them a reward. This little mouth would be perfect. Give them a feel of what the Republic will be good for once we’ve won. I’ll owe you a favor.”

 _No, no, no, no, no-_ Ben thinks, panic fluttering in his chest. _Not tonight, Hux was back ._

The Commander makes a show of thinking it over, but Ben knows he’s only doing it to push Treda to sweeten the deal. Once Treda does, the Commander agrees readily. “He’s yours, just send him back in one piece.”

“Go get yourself prettied up,” Treda orders Ben. “I’ll send for you in a few hours.”

 

* * *

  
The Commander wasn’t lying when he told Treda that he locked Ben in his room at night. There was a high-end security lock on his door that could only be opened by someone with the right password, or the executive command override.

What the Commander never took into account was that he had given his son a copy of the executive command override for his suite.

Late at night, once he’s confident that everyone is asleep, Ben slips out of his room and pads silently on bare feet out of the Commander’s private suite. This isn’t the first time, and he knows the path to take to avoid the droids and security holocams. Moving slowly, he makes his way down two floors to the student dormitories, pausing here and there in the dark hallway to listen for footsteps. He isn’t sure what the Commander would do if they ever caught him. Kill him, maybe.

He’s even less sure if he would care.

But Hux would be punished too, if they found out where he was going, and that, at least, Ben couldn’t bear.

The command override card opens the door to Hux’s room too, which slides open silently. It’s dark inside, and Ben makes his way to Hux’s bed by rote memory. Once his eyes adjust to the blackness, he sees that Hux is curled up in his narrow bed. His hair is soft, freshly washed, and he has one hand pillowed under his cheek. He looks softer, less stern, when he’s asleep.

Slowly, trying not to wake him, Ben climbs into the bed behind him, sliding quietly under the blanket.

“Mmn- Ben?” Hux mutters, when Ben touches him.

“I didn’t want to wake you up. Go back to sleep,” Ben whispers.

“No, no- I-” he sounds like he’s fighting his way towards wakefulness. “I want to- I missed you. How-”

“I’m okay,” Ben lies. “Rest, okay?”

Hux stops trying to sit up, and Ben curls around him from behind. One arm loops around Hux’s skinny chest. Ben is a few years younger than Hux, but he grows like a weed even on the crap they feed him, so they’re just about the same size. He presses his forehead to the warm back of Hux’s neck, just below his hairline. He smells clean, like he’s just gotten out of the refresher.

Hux’s hand covers Ben’s on his chest. The touch is so soft that it hurts.

“Missed you,” Ben mutters against his skin, even though he wants Hux to go back to sleep, wants them to stay just like this, but he can’t help it.

“I worried about you every day,” Hux says quietly.

“Nah, I’m okay.” Hux never calls him on it when Ben says he’s fine, even though they both know he’s lying. It’s one of the things he appreciates about Hux. He knows that Ben needs to say it, even if it’s not true.

“Where was your mission to? Did you go anywhere fun?”

“We went to some dull peace negotiation on Helit, and I got to stand around and look like I was being useful while Admiral Sloane did all the important work. I fetched the caf.” Hux snorts.

“Your dad was pissed you didn’t tell him.”

“I know.” The amused tone in Hux’s voice is gone. He strokes his thumb apologetically over the back of Ben’s hand.

“He thinks you’re fucking her. Like you’re her boy toy or something.” He isn’t sure why he says this, although it’s true. The words make him feel crude.

“I’m not.”

“I know.”

The only person Hux has ever had sex with was Ben.

_“Do you want to?” Ben had offered, pressing himself languidly against the erection he could feel digging into his hip. Because what else could someone want from him, if not his body?_

_They were lying there in Hux’s narrow little dorm bed, too small for them both to fit unless they were practically smashed against each other. Hux’s hand was warm on the small of his back, under his shirt, and he was practically riding Ben’s thigh._

_“We can fuck, I don’t mind.” Hux was older than Ben, but he’d said he’d never done it before. “I can show you how.”_

_“Only if you want to,” Hux countered, suddenly stern, pulling back from where he had been leaving such nice, warm kisses against the side of Ben’s neck. “I mean it. Only if you want it too. I won’t be like him.”_

_Ben’s first instinct had been to say that of course he wanted it. He had said those words a hundred times before, moaned them, whined them, and they hadn’t ever been true. It was just what you said during sex._

_But there’s a hint of steel in Hux’s pale eyes, and a knife’s edge to his voice when he says, ‘I won’t be like him’, and Ben thinks that maybe in this case, saying he wanted it when he didn’t would be an awful thing to do. Hux was probably the only person Ben had met since the Order captured him that he didn’t wish would get blown to pieces, and Hux didn’t want to be like his father._

_So Ben said, “Okay, so we won’t.”_

_He still sort of half-expected to get fucked regardless of what he said, but for just a minute the novelty of getting to say ‘no’ was thrilling._

_“Alright.” Hux kissed him again, just under his ear, but it was more affectionate than wanting. “Can we stay like this?”_

_Ben nearly laughed, drunk on pleasant surprise. Was Hux going to ask him everything? “I don’t think there’s room on your bed for us to be further apart.” And, Ben realized, he really didn’t want to be._

Even though they’ve been doing this sneaking around thing for over a year, curled up behind Hux in his narrow bed is still Ben’s favorite place to be.

“He thinks everyone is as disgusting as he is. It’s him and the other vile, nepotistic old bastards like him who are strangling the Order. They’re the very worst of the Empire.” Hux sounds passionately, quietly furious and Ben presses a mollifying kiss against the back of his neck. “Their poison ate away at the Empire from the inside, and now they’re trying to do the same to the Order. They want to turn it into something vile, no better than the fucking Republic-”

“Hey, excuse you.”

“Sorry,” Hux amends. “I didn’t mean it like that.”

Hux used to talk a lot more shit about the Republic, before he started talking to Ben. Ben’s been working on him, slowly, but it still slips through sometimes. He doesn’t really mind. When they bicker like this, Ben can almost pretend that they’re somewhere else, in other lives. They go to the same boarding school, maybe, and started dating to piss off their parents, and Hux is awful sometimes because that’s how he was brought up, but Ben loves the way he smiles. Or maybe when Ben ran away, all those years ago, instead of the First Order he just ran into Hux, who had run away from his own father, and they decided to be runaways together. They’re in their bunk, safe on their ship, arguing about whose home planet is cooler.

They’re nice fantasies. He used to tell them to Hux, sometimes, but it always made him look like he was going to cry, so Ben doesn’t do it anymore. He knows that Hux wishes he could save him more than anything in the galaxy.

“Admiral Sloane understands,” Hux continues. “We’re going to change things. Get rid of the whole lot of them. It’s just going to take time.”

“I believe you. You’re going to fix everything, one day.”

“I am. I promise.”

Hux shifts around in the circle of Ben’s arms then, turning over to face him. “Hey, don’t-” Ben starts, but it’s too late.

He closes his eyes, and feels a thumb brushing gently over his split lip.

Ben has already seen himself in the refresher mirror, after the Commander finally finished with him for the night and he crept off to take a shower. He doesn’t need to see it reflected in Hux’s eyes. His lip is split and there’s a scratch high up on his cheek from having his face shoved into the carpet while he was fucked from behind. The low scooped collar of his shirt does nothing to hide the smattering of embarrassing bite marks and bruises.

“Did he do this?” Hux’s voice is low, cold, like he’s considering doing something about it, father or not.

“Nah, it was a couple of junior officer corps guys.” Ben tries for flippant, but it only comes out strained. “I’m rent-to-own now, apparently. Yours for three easy payments of ninety-nine credits.”

“Ben, stop.” His thumb touches the scratch on Ben’s cheek.

“Sorry,” he apologizes out of habit.

“What were their names?”

“I’m not sure. I was kinda trying not to pay attention. Kinado was one. I think another might have been Drace-”

“Thrace?” Hux asks sharply. “Short, blue eyes, crooked teeth?”

“Yeah, that’s him.”

_Kinado was lean and curly-haired. He held Ben from behind, wrenched his hands behind his back, while Thrace pressed in close and shoved a knee up between Ben’s legs. Pinned between the lengths of their bodies, he tried not to struggle, not to resist, just give them what they wanted- Thrace’s crooked teeth were on his neck, and someone’s hand was shoved, fumbling, into his pants. Someone grabs his soft cock, hard enough to make him yelp. Laughter. That knee hikes his legs apart, hands hold him in place, and then there are fingers shoving roughly at his hole. “Guys, feel how wet this slut is-” Thrace says._

_More hands. Just let them have what they wanted, don’t fight it, don’t fight-_

_“Aww, did you get yourself all slicked up for us, like a good little whore?” Kinado hisses in his ear, “Or are Republic bitches just so slutty that they drip like cunts?”_

Shaking his head to chase the memory away, Ben adds, “Tiny dick too, if you’re wondering.”

Hux doesn’t rise to the bait. His eyes remind Ben of chips of green ice. Of something that belongs in the frozen depths of space. “Kinado and Thrace,” he repeats under his breath, like a promise.

Ben doesn’t ask what Hux is going to do. He’d rather not know.

Eventually Hux’s fury burns out, or else he stows it away somewhere to bank for later. Either way, he rubs at his eyes and his fingers come away smeared with wetness. “Is there anything I can do for you now?” he asks.

Hux is the only person who ever asks Ben things like that. Ben knows he hates feeling useless. Hux is an engineer, at heart, although he says he wants to be an officer- Ben as seen some of the little devices and things he’s repaired. _“I like to fix things,”_ he'd admitted once, like this was something to be ashamed of. Ben knows that Hux wishes he could fix him, and Ben wishes even more that he was something that could be fixed.

“I’m really sore,” Ben forces out, hating how small the words are.

“Ben, I didn’t mean _that_ -”

“No, I know- I know. I just mean-” he takes a breath, steadies his voice and hates how his jaw wants to lock up, hates what they’ve made of him that asking for something so small is so hard, “ _Fuck_. Would you mind maybe rubbing my shoulders? Or-”

“Of course I will,” Hux says quickly, cutting him off. “Of course, sweetheart. Anything.”

“Thank you,” Ben breathes, scrubbing at his eyes a little. “Thanks, thank you-”

“Here, turn over on your stomach.”

Ben does, and Hux shifts over awkwardly to give him room to lie down, before straddling his waist. “Is this okay?” he asks softly.

“Yeah, it’s fine.” Ben trusts Hux. Hux is probably the only person he trusts.

_Hux’s first time, when they finally did have sex, had been in this bed too. Ben had ridden him, sinking down on his cock slowly, both because Hux was big and because he wanted to make it feel good. Ben’s first time had been awful. He wanted Hux’s to be perfect._

_“Oh, fuck-” Hux had panted. He couldn’t decide where to put his hands- on Ben’s hips or his thighs, or grabbing the blankets._

_“Does it feel good?”_

_“You feel incredible, fuck-” His eyes fluttered closed, pale lashes resting on flushed cheeks. “You’re so-.”_

_Ben rocked a little as he bottomed out and Hux groaned._

_“Just tell me what you want. I’ll make it feel good.” Hux bit his lip, nodded. And that alone was pretty new, not the words, but that he meant them. He wanted Hux to feel good._

_He rode him slowly at first, feeling the slick drag of Hux inside him. Ben tries to move the way he knows feels good, clenching in the right places, but he’s hard, and that’s new too when he’s doing this, and it’s distracting. Ben chokes out a little moan when he shifts and the head of Hux’s cock brushes over his prostate, sending sudden lightning bolts of pleasure through him._

_He gasps when Hux moves his hips and does it again-_

_“Is that okay?” Hux pants, and Ben nods because he can’t seem to make words just now. If Hux wants to- if he wants to make him-_

_They move together, rocking, and at some point Hux had opened his eyes, and was staring at Ben with something close to awe. “You’re so gorgeous like this.” Ben felt his ears turn pink. Hux trailed a hand hesitantly down Ben’s stomach, like he was asking permission. “Can I-?”_

_Ben nods, even though he isn’t sure exactly what Hux is asking permission for, but then Hux’s hand brushes over his flushed, aching cock and Ben nearly sobs. He kisses Hux instead._

_Neither of them are very familiar with kissing. It’s messy, awkward, but perfect too._

_“Lovely, you’re so- I can’t believe how handsome you are, can’t believe you’re my-” Hux seems to have given up trying to keep quiet, but he is muttering the most unforgivable things against Ben’s lips. Ben wants him to stop- each sweet word jabs at something soft and hidden inside him, but he also can’t get enough. Ben whimpers. Hux is stroking his cock in time with their thrusts, and saying such cruel things. They must be cruel, why else would they hurt so much?_

_“Stars, you’re beautiful- gorgeous, sweetheart, fuck, you’re so gorgeous when you feel good- You’re like a fucking prince and I can’t-” he groans, “You have the sweetest mouth, Ben- so pretty-”_

Hux is careful of the scabbed bite marks on Ben’s shoulders as he kneads his hands carefully over the muscle there. It’s almost too gentle, like he’s afraid Ben is going to break under his hands and he will have no idea how to put him back together.

“How’s that, sweetheart?”

“Good. s’nice,” Ben says in a small voice, half muffled by the pillow.

“Tell me if it hurts.” He drags gentle pressure up Ben’s spine and then out, spreading his fingers over Ben’s shoulders and back. “You’re so lovely, Ben.” He presses a chaste kiss to the knob of his spine before withdrawing. “So strong.”

Hux lavishes him with gentle praise- beautiful, strong, brave- while he gently rubs the lingering ache out of his muscles. Something cracks inside of him and he cries just a little, burying his tears in Hux’s pillow, not even sure what set it off.  
  
“Shhh- it’s alright, sweetheart. Don’t cry. Everything is going to be alright one day, I promise.” Hux’s voice isn’t really made to be comforting. It’s too clipped, too nasal, not like the voices that soothed him in childhood, but it comforts Ben anyway. He drags a hand over his eyes.

"I'm okay." He's not okay, not really, but well enough to pretend. “Ugh. Sorry I got snot on your pillow.”

“It’s not the worst thing that’s been on my pillow,” Hux answers casually, working a tight muscle near Ben’s spine.

“Great. Thanks for that mental image.” He tries for lighthearted but doesn’t quite manage it.

They are quiet for a long time.

“In that other world you told me about- the one where we ran away together-” Hux begins, “How do we make money? Do you have a trust fund or something I don’t know about?”

“We didn’t really run away together. We sort of ran away separately and then ran into each other.”

“Avoiding the question.”

“I don’t know. We grift, probably." Ben says, although actually he does have a trust fund. But the whole point of the Running Away fantasy was that he doesn't use it. "Find some place nice and sunny and hustle tourists with our awful, completely invented sob stories about being lost and abused and just needing a few credits for a shuttle home.”

Hux hums. "Minus the sunny, you have yourself a deal.”

“I’d like to see you somewhere sunny. I bet you turn bright red.”

“I do, it’s awful,” Hux agrees. “If you take me to a desert planet, I’m taking the shuttle and leaving you there to die.”

Ben snorts. “Okay, fine. Touchy.”

“What else do we do for money, in this other life?”

“You repair things. Fix ships and skimmers and things. I steal.”

“You’re a thief?”

“I’d be a great thief. No one ever notices me around. I’d steal you a UV-shield, and then we could go to that sunny tourist planet together.”

“And what makes you think I want to run away to some awful sun-planet with a teenage thief?”

Ben drifts off to sleep with Hux’s strong soldier’s hands rubbing circles on his back, and Hux’s soft voice in his ear, and dreams of another life heavy in his heart.

* * *

  
  
Hux kisses Ben's shoulder once he realizes he's asleep. He has been fighting tears for long minutes now, not wanting Ben to see him cry.  
  
The bed is too narrow for them both to lie flat, so Hux props himself up on one elbow. Ben needs the sleep more than he does. He'll have to wake in a few hours to sneak back to his quarters. Brendol can't find him gone.  
  
Hux was going to kill the old man one day. He'd made the promise to himself the first time he saw a bruise on Ben's pale skin. He would kill everyone who had ever hurt Ben, tear the galaxy down around them and rebuild it into one where Ben was safe and happy, always.   
  
Until then, Hux can curl around Ben and protect him from all the dangers of a darkened bedroom. It's the best he can do for now. 


End file.
